Mynydd Graig Goch - My Final Welsh 2000ft Peak!

Sunday 16th March 2014 

A misty day on the western hills of the Nantlle Ridge to climb my last Welsh Nuttall 

Distance: 11km; Ascent: 660m; Misty on the hills; with Colin

See tracked route in new window

After yesterday's two walks in the Arenigs and the Glyders, I now only had one 2000ft peak left in Wales that I hadn't yet climbed: Mynydd Graig Goch in western Snowdonia.  Therefore today we set out to rectify that with a pleasant walk along the western section of the Nantlle Ridge, to visit not only Mynydd Graig Goch, but also two other nearby peaks that Colin had yet to climb.

We set off walking from a small carpark just over half a kilometre NW of Llyn Cwm Dulyn at around quarter to eleven and headed along the access track to the reservoir, before gaining the NW spur of Mynydd Graig Goch and ascending up into the mist.

Approaching Llyn Cwm Dulyn

Heading for the NW spur of Mynydd Craig Goch

Frog (or toad?) spawn

Soon after midday we reached the rocky summit of Mynydd Graig Goch (Nuttall), where we spent a short while identifying by GPS which one of the many rocky outcrops was actually the true summit.  Once we had found it we stopped here for lunch before enjoying a celebratory dram whilst reflecting back on the large number of excellent days hill walking I've had climbing all the Welsh 2000ft peaks since 1997.

Celebrating with a dram on the summit of Mynydd Graig Goch

Summit rocks of Mynydd Graig Goch

After feeling suitably refreshed, we headed east over moorland to eventually descend out of the cloud as we reached Bwlch Cwm Dulyn.  From here we picked up a well worn path for a few hundred metres before concluding it didn't ascend the next hill; therefore instead we headed up the rough ground into the mist to reach the trigpoint and summit cairn of Garnedd-goch (Nuttall).

The cloud cleared as we descended to Bwlch Cwm Dulyn

Summit of Garnedd Goch

From here it was a pleasant, if misty, walk along the ridge to reach our highest point of the day at the summit of Craig Cwm Silyn (Nuttall, Marilyn), where we met the only other walkers we saw all day.  After a short break at the summit we retraced our steps for around three quarters of a kilometre before taking a traversing line westwards around Garnedd Goch towards Llyn Cwm Dulyn.

Descending out of the cloud towards Llyn Cwm Dulyn

Llyn Cwm Dulyn with Mynydd Craig Goch beyond

We soon dropped out of the cloud as we descended and there we good views down towards Llyn Cwm Dulyn and across to the hills of the Lleyn Peninsula in the distance.  Lower down we picked up a faint path down a bit of a ridge to reach the outflow of Llyn Cwm Dulyn, from where we followed our outward route back down the access track.  We reached the car shortly before half-past three after a pleasant walk, and headed back home along the A55 happy that I had now completed one of my many hill bagging aims :-)

Looking back to Craig Cwm Dulyn